Courtesy of Tammy Greer.
The Medicine Wheel Garden at the University of Southern Mississippi Hattiesburg.
Amidst the sidewalks, parking lots, and the glass, steel, and concrete structures of the 300-acre University of Southern Mississippi’s Hattiesburg campus, one finds a sudden oasis; a verdant healer’s garden, filling a circle of approximately 1,000 square feet, right in the middle of everything.
Derived from various Native American traditions, the university’s Medicine Wheel garden, also known as a “sacred circle” or “sacred hoop” features a design with a central focus and four paths radiating outwards, dividing the garden into separate pie-shaped beds.
“In addition to the four cardinal directions, the four paths represent the different seasons of the earth and the different seasons of our lives,” said Tammy Greer, an associate professor in the university’s school of psychology, the director of the Center for American Indian Research and Studies, and the garden’s creator and ongoing steward. “They represent the elements of fire, earth, water, and air and the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of our lives. The medicine wheel teaches us that all these elements need to be in balance and equally developed for us to be healthy, happy individuals and communities.”
The garden itself is made up of indigenous plants traditionally used by Native Americans not only for medicine but for weapons, pigment, cordage, basket weaving, housing, food, drink, and trade items.
Courtesy of Tammy Greer.
The Medicine Wheel Garden at the University of Southern Mississippi Hattiesburg as it was first being planted.
Greer, who is a member of the United Houma Nation, first conceived of the project when graduate student Joe Bohanan asked her to assist with an on-campus powwow he was organizing. The event was being sponsored by the Golden Eagle Inter-tribal Society, a USM student group whose mission is to educate and inform about the ancient, historical, and contemporary presence of First Nations peoples in the Southeast.
“Native Americans are less than one percent of US academic faculty,” said Greer. “So, I was happy to do whatever I could to help bring this awareness to USM.” The event was a success and afterward Bohanan asked Greer, ‘What else would you like to bring to this campus?’”
“In addition to the four cardinal directions, the four paths represent the different seasons of the earth and the different seasons of our lives. They represent the elements of fire, earth, water, and air and the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of our lives. The medicine wheel teaches us that all these elements need to be in balance and equally developed for us to be healthy, happy individuals and communities.” —Tammy Greer, an associate professor in the university’s school of psychology, the director of the Center for American Indian Research and Studies, and the garden’s creator and ongoing steward
Greer’s first thought was of the elders in her community who had spoken to her about losing their connection to the natural environment. “Before 1830, this was Choctaw land,” Greer said. “When so many of our community were removed from this land, it left the others feeling like they had to lay low and stay to themselves. That really took a toll on our culture.” Consequently, Greer says many elders admitted to no longer knowing the names or the uses of the plants that were once so important to their ancestors. She wondered if she could do something to reestablish the connection.
Courtesy of Tammy Greer
Wild Poinsettia (Euphorbia heterophylla) growing in the University of Southern Mississippi Hattiesburg Medicine Wheel Garden.
In 2005, Greer and Bohanan applied for and received a small grant from the non-profit Seva Foundation to begin construction of a garden that would include plants and healing herbs that had been the lifeblood of native communities in the Southeast region of the United States. Then, they approached University CFO Gregg Lassen and asked for land to install a traditional Medicine Wheel. “I thought they’d put us on some of USM’s wooded property,” Greer said. But Lassen offered them space smack in the middle of campus with the stipulation that they—not the university—would be responsible for tending it.
The spot they’d been given was so barren that there wasn’t even grass growing there—making the soil the first order of business. Greer and Bohanan trucked in a combination of soil, mulch, and organic material to lay out the wheel pattern.
“Joe and I didn’t know anything about native plants and where to find them,” Greer admitted, so the two of them dove deep into the study of traditional Native medicine and Medicine Wheels. Greer photographed the space from a third-story window and started taking her pictures to fairs and festivals to ask for native plant donations. People began contributing plants, but it was slow going.
Courtesy of Tammy Greer
Late Boneset (Eupatorium serotinum) growing in the University of Southern Mississippi Hattiesburg Medicine Wheel Garden.
Then, at a Choctaw Indian fair, Greer met an elderly couple who took an interest in her project. Shortly after their encounter, Joe and Merrill Willis arrived on campus with a vehicle and trailer overflowing with native plants. The garden was off and running.
Today, some plants growing in the Medicine Garden include rose mallow for treating dysentery and urinary ailments. There’s coreopsis for making pigment, and salt bush for treating fever, colds, and flu. The coral honeysuckle has been used for centuries in Native cultures for basketweaving. “My ancestors used to throw this buckeye into slow moving water to stupefy the fish,” Greer said. “Then, they could scoop them out to serve at large gatherings.”
There’s swamp cane for constructing blowguns and flutes, devil’s walking stick for dye, wax myrtle for candles, and dozens more indigenous edible and medicinal plants growing together the way they once did under the hands of Indigenous healers.
“We have a domination paradigm in this country where we think, ‘This is in my way, so I have to get rid of it’ instead of considering whether we can live in harmony with it,” said Greer. “Down below all these plants are a community. They hold water in the ground and shade each other. They have a lot to teach us.”
Courtesy of Tammy Greer.
Wild Senna (Senna hebecarpa) growing in the University of Southern Mississippi Hattiesburg Medicine Wheel Garden.
Though Greer created the garden primarily as a space for her community elders to learn about the plants and study their medicinal properties, it also serves as an outdoor classroom for school field trips. The Mississippi Humanities Council funds workshops where participants harvest plant medicines, pigments, and cordage from the garden. It’s a quiet place for USM students to study or socialize, for birds to build their nests, for butterflies to lay their eggs.
“We’ve taken too many wild spaces and made them into parking lots and homesteads,” Greer said. “These plants no longer have a place to be. If the native plants are gone, the bugs and birds don’t have a place to live. The birds don’t have bugs to eat. Pollinators can’t find pollen. This garden is here to remind us we still need all this wildness and diversity in our world and that there’s room for every one of us. Those are just some of the lessons it can teach us.”
